The Newsy video I am doing my story on is “How Robots and Humans can Peacefully Coexist”. The video itself doesn’t give an answer to the question, more as say the question is useless, because the fear is irrational, and technology is good. It does give examples to why robots are good, and how they are improving for interacting with humans, but it address some serious questions, and never gives an answer to them. It talks about in the article about robots taking jobs, but brushes it off. I want to see some things from both sides, and find out how people truly think this whole robot and human situation can end with peaceful coexisting.

Here is a snippet of the story I am writing.

With only 21 percent of jobs right now completely safe for been taking over by robots, people worry about the ability humans have to coexist with robots peacefully. Most of these fears come from automation soon stealing their jobs, and taking over the world. These claims have evidence to support them, but they do not negate the positive effects robots have had on society. Scientists want robots, and humans to coexist peacefully, and work for that to happen. No one wants the human race to end like a crappy science fiction movie.

There is a website that gives you short videos on news about various topics. These topics can be sports, politics in the U.S and world, entertainments, science and more. This website is NEWSY.com, and it is a place to go if you want quick news. It has four tabs to pick from for its news and those tabs are, Headlines, Policy, Culture, and Sci/Tech. The videos on NEWSY.com come with a written transcript underneath. Though they try to be organizes, it is very messy and that makes it easier to click on something you don’t want to. I looked at the story called “Equal Pay Day is April 4th This Year- Here’s Why It Matters.” The story was concise, and got to the point. I personally feel I would have liked more information, but that is because I like more in depth stories. NEWYS.com to me is made for most people nowadays who want things quick. My only worry is people will watch these videos and feel like they are well informed, when these videos truly just scratch the surface of the topic they talk about.

Hyperlocal news site is news organizations that covers stories on a very small level of a community. I think the town I am from Valrico has its own newspaper, and they seemed to be doing fine, but with what I have been reading I could be wrong. Hyperlocal news sites cover events in a small community, and it seems like no one in the community is willing to pay for it. The cost of ads on such small level from business owners in the community you’re writing for is more expensive. It would be more beneficial to do regionally or national ads, and you can’t do that with hyperlocal news. I hope that hyperlocal news can be a thing that is possible, because it’s important to know what is going on in your home town. It can also give you a new perspective on the place you live. Until they find a way to make it profitable, I think it spreading and becoming well received will be just a dream.

With 20 to 30 million current victims of human trafficking, Florida is not exempt from that statistic, but there are ways normal Floridians can help fight this pandemic. The state and the police in Florida have done a lot to combat human trafficking, but it is hard to track down these victims. With the citizens’ help, it could be easier. Former New York City police Jocelyn Little, said when she was on the force, they would find these people everywhere: vans, cars, airports, buses and cargo containers. Many times, a single tip would set off these discoveries.

The first step for Florida residents in helping stop human trafficking is education. “The first thing I think goes back to being educated, understanding the scope and the depth of the problem.” Said Michele Newsome, the director of Porch Light, a safe home for minors who have been trafficked, when asked what’s the first step with getting involved to stop human trafficking. This education includes understanding what human trafficking encompasses and the warning signs that someone is being trafficked. Some of the warning signs are unexplained injuries, like bruises, cuts, and black eyes. Other warning signs include people unable to handle their money and unexplained tattoos. There are many other warnings signs to look out for, and knowing them could save a life. When you see a situation that does not look right, you must use this knowledge to call in. There is the Florida Abuse Hotline, National Human Trafficking Resource Center, and U.S Department of Justice you can call, and report this too. Calling in could save a life, or lives of victims of human trafficking.

After education comes action, and getting involved in organizations or spreading awareness in your own ways are great ways to help out. There are organization everywhere in Florida trying to stop human trafficking. One in particular is Porch Light of Lakeland. They are the first safe house specifically for minors who have been trafficked in Florida. They go out into the community constantly trying to educate people and create awareness of human trafficking. Other organizations include Global Child Rescue, Klaas Kids, Zonta Club of Tallahassee, and the Florida Coalition against Human Trafficking. Getting in touch with one of these organizations is a great way to stop human trafficking, but there are other actions you could do too. This could be talking to local and state government, hosting awareness events, encouraging schools to talk about human trafficking, and students could also join an anti-human trafficking club, or make one themselves.

Human trafficking is a global problem, and the fight against it is everywhere, and that includes Florida. Getting involved and helping stop human trafficking is something possible for all Floridians. It can be as simple but important as calling in something suspicious, or something more involving like creating awareness events. All of these actions can’t happen without education. This is why researching on human trafficking is important, it grants Floridians the ability to be another person in the fight against human trafficking.

I am not that good at taking photos, or having the eye of an artist, so this photojournalism story is weird for me. I know it won’t be ridiculously hard, but I am still worried about it. When I first asked myself what I would do my story on I came up blank. I have seen tons of photo stories in the past couple of years, but I could not remember one of them when I read this assignment. It was only when I looked at examples I came up with an idea. Unfortunately I do not like this idea, and I hope with more pondering I can think of something else. The idea I have right now is visiting places in Ybor or Tampa, whichever is more convenient and take photos of activities you can do there. This is easy and a tiny bit boring to me, but I think I could get nice photos that be hard to mess up on. Though hopefully by the end of the week I can think of something I find more interesting to do.

I am currently going back and forth between what I want do my service story on. One part of me wants to go to the Criminal Justice Teach In at HCC and find a topic I connect to, to write about. Another part of me has always been interested in human trafficking and I want to spread awareness to stop it in Florida. I think I will have my answer after attending the criminal justice teach in. As of now, I’ll just do my research on Human trafficking as if that is the topic I am hundred percent sure of.

I learned about human trafficking at the age of ten at a summer camp, weirdly enough. It truly disturbed me and I have always wanted to talk about it. I think it is such an important issue that a lot of people don’t know what to do about in their day to day lives. I would like for them to know that there are things out there that they can do that are easy. So as long as nothing crazy inspiring is said to me at the Criminal Justice Teach In I will stick with the topic of human trafficking.

My story in a very general sense is about how the Dogon tribe inspired Polite’s children’s book, and how he thinks it will help children. I want to talk about the specific lessons he takes from this tribe and puts in his book. I think it is interesting in how he takes these old lessons and makes them relevant for children today. This story was of convenience to be honest, but seeing as it is black history month and the characters in the book are based off of Tupac and Malcolm X, I think it’s a perfect time to release this story. Also to mention the author is black and he places his story in Africa.

Now when I was thinking about the HCC students and how it would be relevant to them I was worried about talking in detail about a children’s book. I thought of how that could be boring for adults. That’s why I focused on the unique history of this tribe, thinking that would be more interesting to young adults.

My main human source for this story will be Andre, and then me. I will check his facts, and do my own research. I need to learn more about the tribe and the facts versus fantasy to write this story. This is a real concern to me because my main source was very biased on his ideas of this tribe. I will be doing my research using, Web searches, library, Andre Polite, and the book Sirius Mystery, by Robert KG Temple.

Some of the question I asked Polite were, “What is the release date of the book?”, “What is the book about?”, “Where is the setting of this story?”, “What does this story mean to you?”, and “What do you want children to get from this story?”

This interview was a challenge for me, and preparing for it didn’t help me much. I made sure to have my question well thought out and ready for the interview. I also looked up Andre Polite a little to get some information on him. Not much came up when I looked him up and the questions I prepared gave me a false sense of security that I knew where this interview was going.

In all honesty I had two choices for this interview and that was strippers or a guy who was writing a children’s book. This being my first interview and being nervous, I picked the guy writing the children’s book. I was more secure on being able to contact him and set a date then I would have been with the strippers. I also knew Andre, so it made me feel more comfortable. I thought it would be cool to write about a brand new author letting his work out for the first time.

The challenges in this interview was truly creating the story and not making it over complicated. The problem from the start with the interview is we focused more on the inspiration of the book its self. He seemed a little reluctant to share the whole story wanting to save something for people to read. I didn’t think this would be a problem during the interview, but writing a story on what inspired this author was hard for me. The topic was complex and I didn’t want to confuse people. I have reworked the first paragraph multiple times and I am still not satisfied. The way I am coming over this is just asking people’s honest opinion on the story and using their advice to make the story better.

The last blog was called The Very Scary Interview, but after said interview I found out it was not scary at all. Now the problem is deciding on what the story is going to be on. The interview got off topic many times and went longer than previously planned. This would have been fine, if now I wasn’t so confused of what I want to write about. For now, I am getting the ball rolling with this possible beginning for my story.

Hook: Two boys go on an adventure of a life time using the stages of initiation from an ancient African tribe to guide them to success.

Lead: Author Andre Polite writes his first children’s book, Star Seed Children of the Ancients and his inspiration is a wild story.

Thesis: The journey to creating this story was unique and has led to a timeless lesson.

Here are some of the questions I had pre prepared for the interview.

Questions

What is the release date of the book?

What is the book about?

Where is the setting of this story?

What does this story mean to you?

What do you want children to get from this story?

How do you think children will be able to use these teachings in their real life?

The topic interviewing scares me, and that’s because the idea of having a one on one with someone you don’t know well seems terrible. I have only interviewed a few people in my life and all three of them were for school projects. Two interviews were with a family member, and the other was with a man who helps run a Hindu temple. The last interview was awkward to say the least. So interviewing as a wannabe journalist is one thing I have to work on.

The dream person for me to interview is Beyoncé. You could probably tell that from the picture in my last blog. Of course, if the interview happened, I would probably choke and have to be escorted out. Unfortunately, from lack of resources and ability I am going to have to start smaller. The person I am going to interview is my fellow club member from toastmaster’s André Polite. He is writing a children’s book that is close to being on shelves. I was surprised by this news, while he was talking with enthusiasm about his new ventures during his speech last Tuesday. I had no idea he like to write and knew right then that he was the person I wanted to interview.

Some of the questions I would like to ask André are, “What inspired you to write this book?”, “What is one thing you want children to take away when they read this book?”, and “What was the most challenging thing about writing this book?” Those are just a few of the questions I would like to ask. As I said before I’m a little scared of this whole interview thing, but hopefully with preparations and a very friendly guy to interview, I will have a good experience that will help me in my future endeavors.